Wednesday, February 20, 2013

As if I needed reminding

... that the political world continues to pull away to the right, hard and fast, leaving me looking like a radical leftist.

More numbers like the ones cited in Ted Rall's toon above from the Pensito Review. They frame almost precisely the conversations I am having at the moment with blue partisans. They usually begin with a variation of Republican talking points 'justifying' the Iraq invasion in 2004 ("We're at war with terrorism", "Anything that keeps me safe I am OK with", "what would you have us do, wait for the next attack", etc.) and generally end along the lines of "I trust Barack Obama to make the right decisions w/r/t the kill list".

Yes, it is hypocritical, Ms. Ball, to support something -- as in anything -- that Obama is doing which you would oppose if Bush (or any other Republican who comes to White House in the future) were president. That's precisely the definition of hypocrisy.

But the vast majority of people really do not know how to respond with anything but apoplexy every time some actual progressive ideas start to surface, particularly on mainstream outlets. Please go to that link and view some of the video that Noah Rothman of Mediaite has embedded, and share his fear and loathing of *gasp* a midday talk show on MSNBC that has a "seeming desire to become a parody of excessive whining and
hand-wringing over society’s perceived ills regularly displayed by only
the most competitive of progressives".

...Now has not just abandoned any pretense of objectivity, but has
overtly courted partisan controversy, hosting some of the network’s
most inflammatory guests and coaxing inflammatory statements out of even
the guarded of news makers and opinion leaders. For 2013, Now has become the network’s most controversial program – by far.

ROFL, and not just at 'inflammatory' used twice in the same sentence. Mr. Rothman, meet Thom Hartmann, a longtime, nationally syndicated actual progressive radio talker -- one which regularly hosts *doublegasp* Socialist Senator Bernie Sanders. One that also has a regular TV gig on RT, Channel 9418 on my Dish Network and also on Direct TV channel 348. (That's one of the low-numbered ones, too, dude.) He also appears on something subversive called "Free Speech TV".

And hey, man: RT was formerly known as "Russia Today". Breathe deeply and slowly into the paper bag...

A couple more things. Alex Wagner isn't a troll; these are. And what she is doing on Now isn't trolling. THIS is trolling. And so is this.

But I hear you can pick up FOX News on your rabbit ears. If that doesn't work then just go to your nearest doctor's office. You can watch TV for free all day there.

As I double back to the point, It would be important to note here that Democrats -- particularly the ones who have abandoned the label "liberal" for "progressive" but think like Krystal Ball -- are not actually progressive. Alas, they are just Democrats.

Following the release of a secret Department of Justice memo (two weeks ago)
that outlines the administration’s legal justification for killing U.S.
citizens, a new Pew Research Center poll has revealed that a majority of
Americans are torn over whether they support the government’s right to
kill them anywhere at any time without due process.

“On the one hand, I
get it—it’s important for the government to be able to murder me and any
of my friends or family members whenever they please for reputed
national security reasons. But on the other hand, it would kind of be
nice to stay alive and have, maybe, a trial, actual evidence—stuff like
that,” said visibly conflicted 39-year-old Nashua, NH resident Rebecca
Sawyer, who, like millions of other Americans, is split over whether
secret federal agents should be allowed to target and assassinate her
anywhere on U.S. soil.

“I wouldn’t mind if federal officials blew up
other citizens and claimed it was in the name of my safety. But it’s
just that when it comes to me, I guess I’d rather not be slaughtered by
my own elected officials on charges that never have to be validated by
any accountable authority. This is tough.”

While most Americans
expressed conflicted feelings regarding the memo, the poll also found
that 28 percent of citizens were unequivocally in favor of being
obliterated at any point, for any reason, in a massive airstrike.